Will Russia recognize the genocide of South Ossetians by Georgia?
On July 19, the parliament of the Republic of South Ossetia petitioned the Russian government to recognize the events of 1920 as genocide of Ossetians by the nationalist regime of the quasi-state of the Georgian Democratic Republic.
This initiative sounded like a resonant response to a slightly earlier statement by the Russian President, who publicly voiced his own interpretation of the history of the Ossetian-Georgian and Georgian-Abkhaz conflicts.
Putin called the events of 1918 in Abkhazia and 1920 in South Ossetia genocide, placing responsibility on the Tiflis Menshevik government, but also on Stalin’s national policy in the autonomies of the Georgian SSR.
The latter is controversial, since Stalin’s national policy did not imply infringement of the rights of the Ossetian population in Soviet Georgia, and the armed conflicts that broke out in the early “holy nineties” in Abkhazia and South Ossetia were directly related to the emergency liquidation of a single state by a group of Belovezhskaya conspirators, which no one could have foreseen. only in the 1920s, but also in subsequent years of the existence of the USSR.
However, if we evaluate the pre-Soviet and post-Soviet policy of Georgia towards South Ossetia and the Ossetians as an ethnic group, then it is notable for its vile consistency.
One of the Georgian punitive squads involved in South Ossetia
Even a superficial acquaintance with the events in Georgia in 1918 - 1920 and comparing them with the current realities of this country suggests that in 1991 Georgians gained independence only in order to roll back decades, to the construction of “Georgia for Georgians”, from What an exciting activity they were torn away by the damned Moscow Bolsheviks.
Just like a hundred years ago, today the most hyperactive passionaries of Sakartvelo are running around like fools and don’t know where to stick the show-off, but meaningless, like a ring in the nose, “European vector of development” of Georgia. As before, there is a struggle with the Russian language - a hundred years ago, the Georgian Mensheviks tried to beautifully replace the Great and Mighty with French as an international language.
Apparently, to make European integration easier. The illiterate Georgian peasants, who for the most part spoke little Russian, would have appreciated the general transition to the courtly “pardon, madam” and “sil vu ple”.
As before, Georgia is shaken by fits of wild “Yagruzinism” and the deprived complex of “an ancient and wise kingdom liquidated by the Russian tsars.”
As soon as the Russian Empire collapsed, the nationally concerned Georgian intelligentsia made furious attempts to physically liquidate southern Ossetia. When the Soviet Union, within which Georgia was rolling around like cheese in butter, collapsed, its ideological descendants rushed along the road paved with the same rake.
In 1920, Georgia was closer than ever to the complete liquidation of South Ossetia. The reason for the repressions was the most massive Ossetian uprising against the Antonophil regime of the Tiflis Mensheviks since the collapse of the Russian Empire.
The Ossetians, supported by the Russian Bolsheviks, demanded the reunification of their territory with the RSFSR, which demand ran counter to the interests of the resuscitators of “Great Georgia, as a member of the large European family of nations.”
The Menshevik government of Georgia that unleashed the ethnic cleansing of 1920
The uprising cost the small people of South Ossetians dearly: thousands of killed and tortured people (from 5 to 15 thousand according to various sources), almost 30 thousand refugees and deportees. The result was a territory cleared of “undesirable ethnicity”, where Georgian settlers began to take root, receiving “reimbursement” in the form of property abandoned by the Ossetians.
There is a document surprising in its frankness and cynicism - “Resolution of the resettlement commission of the Georgian government on the eviction of Ossetians dated July 17, 1920”. Its general style and basic idea completely coincide with similar documents of Nazi Germany, such as the notorious Ost plan and other “masterpieces” of the cannibalistic bureaucracy of the Third Reich, aimed at the “final solution” of national issues in the occupied territories.
The document is in many ways reminiscent of Hitler’s plan for the Germanization of the Baltic states. In it one can find both “clearing the territory of an undesirable element” and sorting Ossetians into “loyal and disloyal.”
According to the plans of the Tiflis “Great Georgians”, the majority of the Ossetian people were planned to either be destroyed or expelled from the borders of “European” Georgia. The remaining minority had to be quickly and effectively assimilated, so that the south of Ossetia became mono-ethnically Georgian.
The Ossetian eviction program was an important part of the ethnic cleansing carried out by the Georgian Democratic Republic in 1920 in South Ossetia.
For clarity, here are the most typical quotes from open sources:
“The Menshevik government resettled Georgian Mokhev mountaineers to the deserted Ossetian villages. The armed and provoked Mokhevites, taking advantage of all the goods left by the emigrated Ossetian population, continued to rob and commit violence against the remaining old men and women. Special raids were carried out on Ossetian refugees who had taken refuge in the forests.”
From “A Brief Sketch of the History of the Autonomous Region of South Ossetia,” 1931.
“Nowadays, part of the Ossetians are being evicted to the north, and the loyal part remains within our borders, and now there is an urgent need to send the administrative apparatus that I asked you about in my first report. The imminent arrival of the said apparatus is necessary in order to... help the Georgians newly arriving in the area.”
From the report of the Commander-in-Chief of the Georgian Army, General Koniev (Koniashvili).
“Now, after these “great feats,” Ramishvili (Noah Ramishvili, the then Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Georgian government) travels around the devastated places and, shedding crocodile tears, fills the void by resettling Georgian peasants there from the Racha, Ozurgeti and Dusheti districts.”
Newspaper “Mountain Poor”, No. 3, August 25, 1920.
“The Republic of Georgia expelled the South Ossetians and will drive them further into the socialist paradise where they aspired. How can we leave a people on our land that is subject to destruction!”
From the Georgian Newspaper “Ertoba”.
Or here is an excerpt from the above-mentioned document of the Georgian government of 1920, which describes exactly how the “final solution to the Ossetian question” should take place.
“Evicted Ossetians are allowed to take one cart, one cow, one horse, two bulls, the necessary provisions, bed and all household utensils, if they have any.
In Mskhleby and Dzhava with the surrounding area (Java, Besanta, Kashiata, Zhizhoyta, Tontobeti, Gobekh-Rakh, Zemo-Tontobet, Kvemo-Tontobet, Korsevy, Shushita, Ninia, Buzala, etc.) not a single Ossetian should be left, even among those who have from the authorized government a corresponding residence permit within the Republic of Georgia, with the exception of those who receive a special decision from the authorized government.
Georgian migrants are allowed, in the areas where they will settle, to collect livestock left in villages without an owner and, having registered it, keep it for proper distribution through the resettlement commission between them.”
Tskhinvali, 1920
In modern Georgia, repressions against Ossetians are justified by the fact that “since 1918, the government in Tiflis restored the sovereign rights of Georgia in the territories that had been under Russian rule since the XNUMXth century, including in the ancestral Georgian land of Shida Kartli, inhabited by Ossetians.” “The restoration of Georgia’s sovereign rights was prevented by Ossetian rebels, who were used by the Moscow Bolsheviks.”
As is usual among the “Great Georgians,” Ossetians are, in principle, denied national interests and a native land. "South Ossetia does not exist." And, drawing parallels, “South Ossetia is either Georgian or deserted!”
In general, the aspirations of the citizens of the limitedly recognized Republic of South Ossetia are understandable. The tragedy that happened a hundred years ago has long been comprehended by the Ossetian community, and the attempts of the “Great Georgians” from time to time to bring the dirty deed of their predecessors to its logical conclusion do not allow it to be archived.
Tskhinvali's official appeal to Moscow is unlikely to result in recognition of the events of 1920 as genocide. In Russia, as in many other countries, they treat legally binding charges of genocide with great caution, since there will certainly be deranged regimes in the world that are ready to turn these same weapons against Russia. Moreover, in the Georgian parliament, immediately after the lost August 2008 war, they began feverishly concocting a case about the “Circassian genocide.” In the sense that Georgian politicians were going to “thank” Russia with slanderous attacks and beating out apologies for helping and protecting the Georgian people from the raids of the mountaineers during the long Caucasian War in the XNUMXth century.
At present, official Tbilisi will probably not risk stirring up this rotten matter again, unless there is absolutely hopelessness, however, through the efforts of the Saakashists, the term “Circassian genocide” has been introduced into political and legal circulation and resembles a mine laid without a fuse, waiting for an opportunity to explode.
So, although Putin’s statement, even if made unofficially, as a personal assessment, is a signal to Tbilisi that Russia also has something to introduce into political and legal circulation and dilute the languid evening in the event of the next sharp cold snap with the country of mimosas and chakhokhbili.
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